By Richie Murray
Swedesboro, New Jersey (June 18, 2025)………Five USAC Eastern Storm wins. Five different tracks.
Justin Grant set a brand new record during Wednesday night’s opener of the 17th edition of Eastern Storm Presented by Levan Machine & Truck Equipment at New Jersey’s Bridgeport Motorsports Park.
After previously winning at Grandview, Selinsgrove, Williams Grove and Port Royal throughout his career, the Ione, California native added Bridgeport to his personal checklist became the first driver to win Eastern Storm features at five different racetracks.
Grant achieved his latest score following a late-race restart in which he made his winning move with five laps remaining to earn his third series victory of the 2025 season in his TOPP Motorsports/NOS Energy Drink – TOPP Industries – LA Poly/Maxim/Kistler Chevy.
Overall, Grant’s 57th career USAC National Sprint Car triumph brought him one step closer to the all-time series win record as he now sits just four behind Brady Bacon (61) for second all-time and five behind Dave Darland (62) for the number one spot.
The victory places Grant as the early Eastern Storm point leader, a major boon toward accomplishing one of his major personal goals of capturing the Eastern Storm title.
“We’re chasing the championship here, but coming into this week, I’m just trying to focus on having fun, trying to go win races and do my thing and quit worrying about points,” Grant stated. “I’m not smart enough to do any of that. I just go out and smash and hope it works out.”
In the process, Grant gained his 49th career USAC National Sprint Car win as a driver for TOPP Motorsports. That’s just one shy of the all-time series record for feature wins by a driver/entrant combo held by Brady Bacon and Hoffman Auto Racing (50).
Pole sitter and reigning Eastern Storm champion Mitchel Moles got the early race edge as he paced around the outside of challenger Kevin Thomas Jr. for the lead on lap one. By lap nine, the leaders were already working lapped traffic, and Moles excelled to extend his lead bit-by-bit, his margin increasing to two full seconds by the halfway mark of the 30-lap main event.
Meanwhile, Grant found his way to second around the outside of Thomas in turn four on lap 20. Mere moments later, disaster struck for Thomas whose car went up in a cloud of smoke on the back straight, forcing him to pull into the infield on lap 21, saddled with a disheartening 17th place finish.
At that moment, with one of his main contenders falling by the wayside, Moles’ lead remained 2.5 seconds over Grant while being seemingly in complete control. However, Moles’ destiny left his grasp when the yellow flag was displayed for the stopped car of Braydon Cromwell (18th) who came to a halt on the back straight on lap 22.
That immediately piqued Grant’s attention as he now knew his second wind had arrived.
“I was really, really excited to see that yellow come out,” Grant admitted. “It took me a while to get around (Kevin Thomas Jr.) there. I was running kind of underneath him. The top looked so dirty, but I finally got up there and got rolling. I rolled by KTJ and I knew we were coming to Mitchel. I felt like I was really carrying a lot of speed up there. Once that yellow came out, I was like, ‘ooh here we go!’ This is what they put your name on the visor for.”
Moles was a staunch defender for the first three laps following the lap 22 restart as he successfully fended off Grant for the time being, running mostly through the middle and sliding up toward the top of turns two and four. All the while, Grant was wound up on the topside, just looking to pick his spot when the moment arrived.
First, Moles successfully denied Grant entering turn one him by sliding himself in order to prevent Grant’s slider attempt on lap 24. However, like clockwork, Grant continued his path up top undeterred, and on lap 25, ducked low off turn four under Moles who was sliding up to the cushion. In the race back to the line, Grant had a half car length edge on Moles.
From that point forward, Grant was in a zone, laying down by far the fastest lap of the race with two laps to go. His 15.149 second mark on lap 28 was more than three tenths faster than any other driver during the duration of the event, cementing his victory at the 4/10-mile dirt oval by a 2.414 second margin at the checkered flag over Mitchel Moles, Briggs Danner, Kyle Cummins and Daison Pursley.
Mitchel Moles (Raisin City, California) came oh-so-close to winning his first career USAC Eastern Storm feature after leading the opening 25 laps. He wound up second, which ranks as his best finish of the 2025 USAC National Sprint Car season thus far.
“All in all, these restarts are what win and lose these races, and guys like Justin who are veterans, they find ways around guys like me. I’m just trying to learn as much as I can. I got a little soft on the restart and started bouncing, and ultimately, missed it off four and that’s what gave Justin the run on me. I’ve never been given anything easy. I feel like I’ve had to earn every win I’ve ever gotten. I don’t think anything’s going to change, so I’ll just go back to the drawing board.”
Briggs Danner grabbed his third career USAC National Sprint Car Honest Abe Roof Fast Qualifier award to start the night. After setting fast time, Danner (Allentown, Pennsylvania) proceeded to run second in his heat and finish third in the feature to provide himself with a nice solid start to his Eastern Storm campaign.
“I felt good early on getting around the top,” Danner recalled. “I didn’t want to see that yellow with lapped traffic coming, which bunched us all back up when I felt I had a shot there. I kind of started to search around and saw Cummins poking on the bottom and just made the best of what I had.”
Robert Ballou was the biggest mover of the feature, advancing plus-six from 13th to 7th in the feature. That earned the Rocklin, California racer Rod End Supply Hard Charger honors.
Steven Drevicki (Reading, Pennsylvania) represented the USAC East Coast Sprint Car contingent proudly. The four-time series champ raced from fourth to first in a lap to score a heat race win. That earned him the Inferno Armor Fire Move of the Night.
Bonuses were up for grabs to the top-three USAC East Coast 360 Sprint Car finishers. At Bridgeport, it was Ed Aikin ($150), Billy Ney ($100) and Patrick Chilmonik ($50).
USAC AMSOIL SPRINT CAR NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP RACE RESULTS: June 18, 2025 – Bridgeport Motorsports Park – Swedesboro, New Jersey – 4/10-Mile Dirt Track – USAC Eastern Storm Presented by Levan Machine & Truck Equipment
HONEST ABE ROOFING QUALIFYING: 1. Briggs Danner, 39, Hogue-14.967; 2. Kyle Cummins, 3p, Petty-14.974; 3. Logan Seavey, 57, Abacus-15.052; 4. Justin Grant, 4, TOPP-15.158; 5. Mitchel Moles, 19AZ, Reinbold/Underwood-15.237; 6. Kevin Thomas Jr., 3R, Rock Steady-15.369; 7. Hayden Reinbold, 19, Reinbold/Underwood-15.452; 8. Kale Drake, 2B, 2B Racing-15.474; 9. Steven Drevicki, 19s, DeGre-15.496; 10. Daison Pursley, 86, CBI-15.530; 11. C.J. Leary, 21AZ, Team AZ/Curb-Agajanian-15.593; 12. Robert Ballou, 12, Ballou-15.632; 13. Jake Swanson, 5T, Daming Swanson-15.668; 14. Joey Amantea, 88J, JPA-15.903; 15. J.T. Ferry, 18, Ferry-16.098; 16. Braydon Cromwell, 4x, Boyd-16.192; 17. Gunnar Setser, 5G, KO-16.265; 18. Abby Hohlbein, 2A, 2B Racing-16.333; 19. Cameron Smith, 96, Kauffman-16.368; 20. Ed Aikin, 7, Aikin-16.628; 21. Billy Ney, 83s, Ney-16.689; 22. Patrick Chilmonik, 1, Chilmonik-17.214; 23. Kayla Roell, 4K, Roell-NT.
CAR IQ FIRST HEAT: (8 laps, all transfer to the feature) 1. Daison Pursley, 2. Briggs Danner, 3. Jake Swanson, 4. Justin Grant, 5. Hayden Reinbold, 6. Braydon Cromwell, 7. Cameron Smith, 8. Patrick Chilmonik. 2:04.574
K1 RACEGEAR SECOND HEAT: (8 laps, all transfer to the feature) 1. Joey Amantea, 2. Kyle Cummins, 3. Gunnar Setser, 4. Kale Drake, 5. C.J. Leary, 6. Mitchel Moles, 7. Kayla Roell, 8. Ed Aikin. 2:06.064
USAC GEAR THIRD HEAT: (8 laps, all transfer to the feature) 1. Steven Drevicki, 2. Kevin Thomas Jr., 3. Robert Ballou, 4. Logan Seavey, 5. J.T. Ferry, 6. Abby Hohlbein, 7. Billy Ney. 2:07.258
FEATURE: (30 laps, starting positions in parentheses) 1. Justin Grant (3), 2. Mitchel Moles (2), 3. Briggs Danner (6), 4. Kyle Cummins (5), 5. Daison Pursley (8), 6. Logan Seavey (4), 7. Robert Ballou (13), 8. C.J. Leary (12), 9. Hayden Reinbold (10), 10. Kale Drake (11), 11. Jake Swanson (14), 12. Joey Amantea (9), 13. Steven Drevicki (7), 14. Gunnar Setser (17), 15. J.T. Ferry (15), 16. Abby Hohlbein (18), 17. Kevin Thomas Jr. (1), 18. Braydon Cromwell (16), 19. Kayla Roell (22), 20. Ed Aikin (20), 21. Billy Ney (21), 22. Cameron Smith (19), 23. Patrick Chilmonik (23). NT
FEATURE LAP LEADERS: Laps 1-25 Mitchel Moles, Laps 26-30 Justin Grant.
USAC AMSOIL SPRINT CAR NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP POINTS: 1-Kyle Cummins-1090, 2-Justin Grant-1011, 3-Mitchel Moles-874, 4-Logan Seavey-854, 5-Robert Ballou-819, 6-Briggs Danner-809, 7-Jake Swanson-781, 8-C.J. Leary-772, 9-Kale Drake-771, 10-Kevin Thomas Jr.-730.
USAC EASTERN STORM PRESENTED BY LEVAN MACHINE & TRUCK EQUIPMENT POINTS: 1-Justin Grant-78, 2-Briggs Danner-77, 3-Kyle Cummins-73, 4-Mitchel Moles-72, 5-Daison Pursley-66, 6-Logan Seavey-64, 7-Robert Ballou-58, 8-C.J. Leary-53, 9-Hayden Reinbold-50, 10-Kale Drake-48.
PARALLAX GROUP USAC NATIONAL PASSING MASTER POINTS: 1-Kale Drake-132, 2-C.J. Leary-58, 3-Kyle Cummins-55, 4-Gunnar Setser-53, 5-Chase Stockon-50, 6-Briggs Danner-49, 7-Justin Grant-47, 8-Robert Ballou-47, 9-Jacob Denney-35, 10-Kevin Thomas Jr.-34.
USAC EASTERN STORM PARALLAX GROUP PASSING MASTER POINTS: 1-Briggs Danner-7, 2-Robert Ballou-6, 3-Kyle Cummins-5, 4-Daison Pursley-5, 5-C.J. Leary-4, 6-Kayla Roell-4, 7-Justin Grant-3, 8-Jake Swanson-3, 9-Steven Drevicki-3, 10-Gunnar Setser-3.
NEXT USAC AMSOIL SPRINT CAR NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP RACE: June 19, 2025 – Big Diamond Speedway – Pottsville, Pennsylvania – 3/8-Mile Dirt Track – USAC Eastern Storm
CONTINGENCY AWARD WINNERS:
Dirt Draft Hot Laps Fastest Driver: Justin Grant (15.027)
Honest Abe Roofing Fast Qualifier: Briggs Danner (14.967)
Car IQ First Heat Winner: Daison Pursley
K1 RaceGear Second Heat Winner: Joey Amantea
USAC Gear Third Heat Winner: Steven Drevicki
Rod End Supply Hard Charger: Robert Ballou (13th to 7th)
Inferno Armor Fire Move of the Night: Steven Drevicki